Wolfgang Hampel. Founder of Betty MacDonald Fan Club and Betty MacDonald Society for Betty MacDonald Fans all over the world.
Wolfgang Hampel interviewed Betty MacDonald's family and other famous writers and artists.
Wolfgang Hampel's Betty MacDonald and Ma and Pa Kettle biography and Betty MacDonald Interviews are very popular all over the world.
Wolfgang Hampel is also famous for his satirical poems and stories.

I'm rereading it at the moment and enjoy it very much.

If you ask for my favourite city for one of the next Betty MacDonald fan club events it should be Seattle.

I hope this dream will come true.

Betty MacDonald fan club newsletter January includes a
new Betty MacDonald fan club surprise - some new never published before
excellent photos of Betty MacDonald and her family.

We recently got some photos of Betty MacDonald's wonderful grandmother Gammy and other family members.

A real golden Betty MacDonald fan club treasure!

Greta,
Britta, Mats, Pieter, Mary and many other Betty MacDonald fan club
newletter team members are working on this new Betty MacDonald fan club
treasure.

We are going to publish the new Betty MacDonald essay by Betty MacDonald fan club research Anita and Eartha Kitt II.The subject is ' Betty MacDonald's life on Vashon Island ' with several never published before interviews of Betty MacDonald's family, friends and neighbours.

Three thousand refugees now arrive in Europe every day, mainly heading for Germany.
It’s hard not to feel uneasy – even fearful – about how German and
European politics are going to evolve in reaction, and how this might
affect the very future of the EU.Paris might still be reeling from the 130 deaths in November’s terrorist attack, but now Germany is recoiling from the multiple attacks on women on New Year’s Eve from apparently young Arab men, many new immigrants or asylum seekers.Terrorism can be dealt with by aggressive police, detection and
surveillance work. The European public may not like the impact on their
liberties, but they can recognise a feasible response is nonetheless
possible. However, managing unreconstructed attitudes towards women by
newly arrived young Arab men is far harder and much more menacing. It
poses the question that a liberal society does not want to confront. Is
cultural coexistence possible – and if not, what is to be done?

The German media, police and criminal justice system have been
agonisingly slow to respond, perhaps hoping that silence would make the
problem go away. But a week later, it is now becoming clear that there
were ugly incidents on New Year’s Eve in many German cities. In Cologne
up to 1,000 men, many described as of North African or Arab appearance,
and aged between 18 and 35, gathered in the huge square between Cologne
cathedral and the main railway station. They let off fireworks and
robbed passers-by. Of the complaints, 117 involved sexual assault,
including two allegations of rape.Wolfgang Albers,
Cologne’s police chief, who did not accept offers of aid from a nearby
police force and issued a press statement on New Year’s Day saying that
NYE had passed off peacefully, has been suspended by the state interior
minister. The local public TV station, which did not broadcast any news
for two days after the events, has publicly apologised. Only now are
German newspapers and politicians beginning to engage with the profound
issues.Some of what is surfacing is pure poison. Police found a crib sheet
on one of the detained men with phrases such as “great breasts” and “I
want to f*** you” translated into German. Another is alleged to have
told police that they couldn’t touch him because: “I’m Syrian, you have
to treat me nicely. Frau Merkel invited me.” Fireworks were allegedly
hurled at the cathedral as a symbol of Christianity.No surprise that Julia Klöckner, the leader of Mrs Merkel’s CDU in
Rhineland-Palatinate, said the attacks had been a wake-up call: “We
really need to take off the blinkers.” No surprise either that the mayor
of Cologne should be derided for advising women to keep men at arm’s length. Who is to blame for women being at risk? Women for simply being women?The German chancellor is trying to steer a course. Recorded before
the events in Cologne, her new year’s message to both her fellow German
citizens and the refugees was to see the crisis as an opportunity.
Germany needs millions of young qualified workers (more than half the
refugees are highly skilled, it’s been said), allowing refugees to give
to the society of which they wanted to be part. But, post-Cologne, she
has begun to strike a different note.“Women’s feelings of being at people’s mercy without any protection,
is intolerable for me personally,” she declared. Her government is to
review its refugee policy, with one likely initiative being immediate
deportation for those convicted of any criminal activity. At the same
time, Merkel is aware of the danger of surrendering to fear. “We must
also keep talking about the basis of our cultural coexistence in
Germany: people rightly expect that actions follow words.”Meanwhile the extreme right has seized on events as proof positive
that Germany must stop accepting refugees immediately or otherwise face
an “impending cultural and civilisational collapse”, as the populist
Eurosceptic Alternative für Deutschland puts it.The initial slowness of response from both police and media was
nothing to be proud of; equally feeding a political tradition whose
antecedents Germans know and fear must be avoided.So far what the Germans call the “Willkommenskultur” is still alive.
Merkel and her SPD coalition partners will insist on the rule of law,
getting tougher on deportation. There will be no talk of noxious
multiculturalism, but instead of cultural coexistence in which the host
society’s values are paramount. The German media will be more vigilant
about honest-to-God reporting.Abroad, Merkel will work for burden sharing, tougher measures to
patrol Europe’s borders and seek solutions to stop the refugees at
source – ending the war in Syria and persuading Turkey to host more
people. Above all, she will look to the refugees themselves to do all
they can to castigate and marginalise the minority who are inducing such
a toxic reaction.The British interest is unambiguous: Merkel must succeed, or a
liberal Germany, and with it a benign European Union, will be lost.
Already the venomous Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán is calling for
tougher border controls, and the need to defend Europe’s values – code
for an excuse for mass expulsion of refugees. He will have a new hearing
in parts of Germany.

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Amid
this growing turmoil, the assumptions on both sides of the referendum
debate are complacent and rest on Britain needing to do nothing to shape
its continent. The pros insist that Europe offers us a great deal,
while sceptics claim we can leave and still trade with an open,
free-trade Europe. Britain, in or out of the EU, can use it as a milch cow. Good old liberal Germany will continue to anchor everyone.It may not. What is being asked of Germany is enormous: it is to
their credit that Germany’s leaders accept it – and to the public’s
credit that so far it has stood behind them. But the latest poll in
Germany for the first time reports a majority in favour of closing
Germany’s borders. More Colognes, and that figure will grow further.Yet this is a common European problem. It would be magnificent if a
leading British politician would make the case for sharing Merkel’s
objectives, and give her and her people a sense that we are with them –
working to the same ends with the same mixture of realism and idealism. I
bay at the moon.

About Me

Betty MacDonald Fan Club, founded by Wolfgang Hampel, has members in 40 countries.
Wolfgang Hampel, author of Betty MacDonald biography interviewed Betty MacDonald's family and friends. His Interviews have been published on CD and DVD by Betty MacDonald Fan Club. If you are interested in the Betty MacDonald Biography or the Betty MacDonald Interviews send us a mail, please.
Several original Interviews with Betty MacDonald are available.
We are also organizing international Betty MacDonald Fan Club Events for example, Betty MacDonald Fan Club Eurovision Song Contest Meetings in Oslo and Düsseldorf, Royal Wedding Betty MacDonald Fan Club Event in Stockholm and Betty MacDonald Fan Club Fifa Worldcup Conferences in South Africa and Germany.
Betty MacDonald Fan Club Honour Members are Monica Sone, author of Nisei Daughter and described as Kimi in Betty MacDonald's The Plague and I, Betty MacDonald's nephew, artist and writer Darsie Beck, Betty MacDonald fans and beloved authors and artists Gwen Grant, Letizia Mancino, Perry Woodfin, Traci Tyne Hilton, Tatjana Geßler, music producer Bernd Kunze, musician Thomas Bödigheimer, translater Mary Holmes and Mr. Tigerli.